


From Darkness Comes Light

by Talithax



Category: Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011)
Genre: Doubt, Friendship/Love, Illnesses, M/M, Mild Language, New Year's Eve, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-01
Updated: 2014-01-01
Packaged: 2018-01-07 00:46:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1113487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Talithax/pseuds/Talithax
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Will's sick, far from thinking his best, and... about to be left on his own.</p>
<p>Or... Is he?</p>
            </blockquote>





	From Darkness Comes Light

**Author's Note:**

> ~ Narrated by Will. Self-beta'd.
> 
> ~ And... yet again I leave it until the last minute to decide to attempt something to mark a specific calendar event. (Go me.) This time, New Year's Eve, and if I don't post it now I'll never post it, so...
> 
> ~ Happy New Year! I hope 2014 brings everything everyone wants it to.

===================  
From Darkness Comes Light  
by TalithaX  
===================

 

“Good afternoon, Mr Hunt. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, involves the re-emergence of one Anton...”

.

.

.

.

Did I...?

Unsure as to...

Well.

Just about everything, basically.

Where exactly, five star hotel room aside, it is I am. My I.D. number. What day of the week it is. The fine line between reality, dreams, and out-and-out hallucinations. What time it is. How long it is I've been like this. Whether I'm actually ever going to fully recover.

Seriously. Just about you name it at the moment and I'm unsure of it.

Take right now for just one example, I don't know if I imagined hearing the disembodied voice of IMF's automated message service...

… Called, Jarvis, I think – although let's face it I could just as easily be wrong – by Benji, after the talking computer in... 

Fuck. I don't know. Some movie series he seems inordinately fond of? Maybe? Or was it a comic?

Or... Maybe he doesn't call the voice Jarvis at all?

I...

Where was I?

That's right.

Simultaneously trying not to cough while attempting, albeit not overly successfully, to ground myself in reality.

Did I really hear the voice that may or may not be referred to as Jarvis by Benji offering Ethan a mission?

And, if I did... What's going to happen now?

Opening my eyes, I struggle – both literally and with no degree of elegance whatsoever – into a half-sitting, half-slumped position against the mound of pillows at my back and, once the room has stopped spinning from this admittedly minor exertion, glance down at the empty side of the bed next to me.

Empty, now...

But...

Ethan had been there, I...

I'm more or less sure of it.

Wanting to keep an eye on me, although he'd airily declared that the only reason he was using the bed was because the only chair in the room was a complete bitch to sit in, he'd...

He had. I... I'm sure of it. When, exhausted from coughing, I'd closed my eyes and slid off to sleep, he'd been on the bed – a warm, reassuring and comforting presence – next to me.

He'd been sitting there, his back against a mound of pillows like mine is now, on top of the bedding while I lay buried under it and most likely snoring if not wheezing, and...

He'd had his iPad with him.

He'd had his iPad in his hand and was most likely reading something on it when... Jarvis' recorded message had arrived and... because he either didn't want to wake me or didn't want me to hear it, he...

… Got up and took it out in to the other room.

Which... Sounds reasonable, right?

I wasn't hallucinating. Ethan had been on the bed with me. And I did hear... Jarvis, in a sense, calling him in.

Which, in turn, means the inevitable is about to take place and Ethan, no doubt with both Benji and Jane in tow as well, is about to leave me. I knew, during my all too brief, not to mention all too infrequent, moments of lucidity, that it had to be coming, of course I did, but...

I...

I don't want Ethan...

Uh...

That is, I don't want... them... to go. Any of them. Not just Ethan. 

I don't even know why I instinctively singled him out because... Ethan. Benji. Jane. Together they're – one and the same – my team, friends, and substitute family. They... all mean the same to me, right? Sure. It probably goes to reason that I admire Ethan the most, and, okay, I sort of have this... quietly content... feeling that we spend the most time together, but... 

The team.

If I'm going to be selfish I should do a good job of it and I should want everyone to stay with me.

I...

Oh God.

I don't want to be alone. Without Ethan...

Ethan.

Again with defaulting to Ethan.

My mind. Honestly. I'm well and truly over this inability to see a thought through and wish my damn head would just get on with – rebooting itself – returning to normal. My physical issues are one, entirely horrible thing, but this... this feeling of empty-headedness is something else again and it's definitely pushing on the boundaries of my patience. I don't, understatement, like being like this and the fact that no one has been able to put a definite timeframe on my recovery scares me.

It scares me a lot.

But...

Whatever. What will be will be and all that. IMF are footing all the medical bills, I'm no longer hooked up to what felt like an entire room full of machines in the hospital, and... I'm alive. My limbs are all intact, I... more or less... have my faculties, and everyone seems confident that, inability to say when exactly aside, I'll make a full recovery.

In time. I just have to be patient. 

Only...

I don't want to be patient on my own.

Which brings me back to...

If Ethan – and, of course, Jane and Benji as well – leave me to go on a mission, I'll be left to deal with the doctors on my own and...

It's pathetic. Make that, really pathetic, but I just don't have it in me. Some, the majority even, are okay. They treat me with indifferent respect and just go through the motions of collecting their samples, checking my vitals and making sure I'm fully up to date with my cocktail of meds. Then there are the others... The ones that view me as either a scientific or medical curiosity and who only want to get involved with my treatment because their dream is to get an article published in a world renowned journal and they see me as their guaranteed path to achieving this.

One...

He was an older man, too. Old enough to know better and, despite looking distinguished in his pinstripe suit, with no people skills at all. To him I was – barely – little more than a lab rat, something to be poked and prodded as though I had no rights and should have been... grateful... to him for deigning to show me some attention. Not content with his collection of samples, he decided to take things further by seeing both what it would take to make me bruise (answer – not a lot) and how long it would take for my blood to clot from a scalpel cut on my arm. I knew it was wrong, especially as the blood ran far too freely down my arm and dripped on to the floor from my fingers, and that he was taking things too far, but... He had me and he knew it. I was too weak, too reliant on everyone around me for everything from doing the buttons up on my pyjama top to making sure I made it back from the bathroom in one piece, to protest and he knew there was nothing I could do to stop him from getting all the answers he thought he needed from my body.

Lab rat. Curiosity. Anomaly. Patient Zero. The... lucky... recipient of all the hard work done by the cartel's scientists in creating their very own attempt at a super virus. Spanish flu... plus... Swine flu... plus... Avian flu... plus... God alone knows what else... equals...

Me.

Because I was the closest to the leader at the time and because, despite knowing that there was no way out, he didn't want to see all their hard work go to waste without getting to see the virus' effect on at least... one human trial, I copped a full dose, and...

From that point onwards things have been a little hazy.

No.

My mistake.

They've been very hazy.

Just as... 

Case in point. Where was I again?

Jarvis... Mission... Being abandoned to the mercy of the too-curious-for-their-own-good doctors... Ethan...

Ethan!

That's right. He...

For reasons unknown, he took it upon himself to walk into the room while the doctor was still marvelling at how long it was taking the wound in my arm to stop bleeding, and, possibly not believing what it was he was seeing, he just lost it. Lost it big time. Dragging, after pulling him forcefully away from me, the doctor into the next room, he gave him a loud, heartfelt lecture on knowing his place before, without letting him collect either his bag or his precious samples, chasing him out of the suite.

He then, once he'd calmed down, returned to the bedroom and, because by this stage I not only pretty much had blood everywhere but also lacked the energy required to do anything about it, helped me into the bathroom and...

Instead of just cleaning the blood off with a flannel and changing my pyjamas, he...

That is, I think...

Hope.

That is, I hope this, out of all the tricks my mind has been playing on me, actually happened and that it wasn't just another one of my fever-inspired dreams.

He...

Showered me. Or, to be more specific, he showered... with... me.

He took my pyjamas off, stripped down to his briefs himself, turned the shower on and then, once the temperature was just right and somehow without once taking his arm away from around my waist, he joined me under the gloriously warm flow of water and washed me. He was so gentle, so very gentle that, for the first time in too long I actually started to feel... okay, possibly even... good. It wasn't sexual, and all I could do was slump against him as he went about his self-imposed task, yet, at the same time it was just... special. Incredibly special. Ethan was looking after me for no reason I could think of other than he simply wanted to and, when being both conscious and upright got too much for me and my knees buckled beneath me, he helped me down onto the floor of the shower and, as the water continued to cascade over us, just held me tightly against him.

Ethan, he...

… Washed me, and held me, and looked after me, and, when I passed out, he somehow managed to get me dry, dressed, and back into bed.

And now he's going to leave me.

I mean... I know that he has to, that... of course... a mission has to come before an incredibly slowly convalescing team mate. Ethan's IMF to his very core and, if they need him, he'll follow their orders. Not unquestioningly, as I know that despite his loyalty to the organisation he's far from blinded by it, but dutifully. It's what he does. He's a field agent, a brilliant, quick thinking and astonishingly good field agent, and... Out in the field is where he belongs. Not here, stuck in a hotel suite with my currently good for nothing ass and feeling as though he has to look after me. Let's face it, I'm an adult for Christ's sake. Granted, a very sickly one who wouldn't get very far if left to his own dithery devices, but... I'll survive. Maybe not on my own, but so long as the doctors keep coming or, alternatively, I just wave the white flag of defeat and go back into hospital, I'll survive without Ethan...

Again with singling out Ethan.

The team.

Be it courtesy of doctors coming to the hotel suite or going back to hospital, I'll survive without my friends hovering around me.

Selfishly, possibly even just a little... needy... of me, I don't want to be without them, but at the same time my dimly recalled sense of logic tells me that I won't die without them, that...

If they're needed elsewhere, they should go.

In fact, they have to go.

Benji might be perfectly happy – so long, of course, that is he's got his computers to entertain himself with – to lurk around in a hotel suite day in and day out, but, Ethan and Jane, they're...

Far more highly strung?

Is that the right way to put it? Inactivity is their shared enemy and they always feel as though they have to be on the go. Being stuck here with me is probably close to their very own personal version of hell. Nothing to do, and no... end date... in sight. Just around the clock boredom while I either sleep, cough, or, in general, give every indication of being not much more than a barely animated zombie.

They...

For their own sakes they need to forget about me and get back out there.

I...

I just need to make sure they know how grateful I am for everything – from their very presence all the way to how Ethan held me in the shower – before they disappear. They deserve to know how much their kindness has meant to me and that, even if I never see them again, I've appreciated their friendship.

Never see them again...

Not...

Shit.

Not like that. Not because I think something will happen to them during the mission, because you... You just don't think like that. Negativity doesn't have a place in field work and I know, that is, I'm confident they'll be able to make it through whatever it is the IMF are asking of them.

It's just...

Maybe... I don't know... Maybe I've been on my last mission with them. The doctors all seem to think that, in time, I'll make a full recovery, that my lung capacity will return along with both my strength and ability to concentrate, but...

What if it takes too long?

Or...

They're wrong, and I don't make a full recovery?

So much is unknown that I...

… I just don't know what to think.

So... Yet again. Where was I?

Jarvis. Mission. Ethan.

Ethan's... in the other room, most likely preparing to leave on a mission, and... I need to pull myself together enough to make sure he knows how grateful I am to him for everything he's done for me.

That... just about covers it, doesn't it?

So...

Move. I have to move.

Just... One step at a time.

So...

Here goes nothing.

Step one. Throw back the bedding.

… Pause. Get breath back.

Step two. Swing legs over edge of mattress.

… Pause. Wait for both room to stop spinning and for coughing fit to get under control.

Step three. Stand up and, on legs that still don't particularly feel as though they're attached to the rest of me, half-stagger and half-lurch over to the door.

…Pause. Lean against door, wheeze, and vow never again to take good health for granted.

Step four. Take a deep breath, close shaky hand around handle, and... slowly pull it open just as the door in the suite's main room is pulled shut from the outside, and...

… Breathe deeply, cough both loudly and hoarsely, and...

Give up.

I took too long to get moving and now, because Ethan's gone already, I've missed my chance.

Damn.

Just... Damn.

The shock of having missed Ethan not combining all that well with the shock my body's feeling at being upright, I grip the door tightly and, not liking my chances of making it back to the bed, decide to see if I can push my luck by making it over to the sofa instead. I doubt it's the greatest idea I've ever had, but don't really know what else to do. The sofa is arguably a little closer than the bed and, besides, in terms of a worst case scenario, I end up collapsing and whoever the doctor it is that Ethan arranges to look in on me finds me lying on the floor.

So, you know, whatever.

Accepting that my worst case scenario will very quickly become a very definite reality if I don't make my move while I still can, I – reluctantly – let go of the door and somehow, don't ask me how, manage to stumble over to the sofa. Collapsing on it with a sigh of relief that quickly gives way to another coughing fit, I curl up against the arm and, feeling both wretched and – already – lonely, close my eyes.

Ethan's done the right thing by choosing the mission over just staying here and providing baby sitting duties. I just...

I just wish he hadn't, that's all. 

I... need them, the team, far more than they need me, but... simply put, I just have to accept that they're needed elsewhere.

I...

I need Ethan.

Not the team.

Ethan.

Just...

… Ethan.

~*~

“Will! Hey... Come on, Will. Wake up!”

Regardless of whether it's the slightly anxious note to the voice entreating me to wake up or the somewhat insistent hand gently shaking my shoulder, something – unexpected and, as such, startling – cause me to wake with a start and, as my eyes fly open, I instantly begin to cough.

I mean, of course I do. I'm awake, ergo I have to do my very best to cough up what's left of my lungs.

“You know, immediately launching into a coughing fit is one way to trample all over my relief at knowing that you hadn't come over all inconsiderate and died on me,” Ethan states wryly as, knowing all too well there's not really anything he can to do help, he frowns down at me from his position in front of the sofa. “Hey... Will. Come on. It's okay. Just... Breathe. You need to calm down and concentrate on your breathing,” he adds just a touch breathlessly himself. “Just... Here...” His frown intensifying, he crouches down and, after very carefully shifting my legs off the sofa, slowly helps me into a more upright position.

“I... Jarvis... You...” Coughing and talking at the same time not really working for me, I give up on even trying and just focus on taking Ethan's advice on concentrating on getting my breathing under control.

Ethan.

He's here. In front of me and handing me a tissue from the box on the coffee-table.

But...

He... shouldn't... be?

I thought...

He'd left for a mission, hadn't he?

The recorded message from Jarvis came through, he accepted the mission, and...

He left.

“Ethan... I...”

“Don't try to speak,” he interrupts, crouching back down and giving my knee a reassuring squeeze. “Just... breathe and let me put my mind at ease by playing doctor and running a few tests on you.” Standing up, he shoots me a clearly worried look before jogging into the bedroom and collecting a few items that, as he jogs back to me, I recognise as having come from the large collection of medical items covering my bedside table. “As you know already,” he murmurs, placing the thermometer and blood pressure monitor on the coffee-table, “you're only out of hospital on the proviso your results remain static and...”

“Really?” I wheeze as, my coughing finally under control for the time being, I let Ethan slip the cuff of the blood pressure monitor over my right arm. “I... I didn't know that.”

“You didn't?” Giving me an odd, unreadable look as he tightens the cuff around my arm, Ethan shakes his head and sighs. “I would have thought... Uh... Never mind. You're not meant to talk while having your blood pressure taken, so... Just let me get this out of the way, yeah...”

Nodding, I let him run his tests in silence as my mind still struggles to compute just what it is he's doing here.

Maybe...

Maybe I'm dreaming again. As explanations go it would have to be as... viable... as any. In reality, Ethan's not really here at all and my subconscious is simply giving in to wishful thinking and letting me think that he's here tending to me because...

… It's what I want so desperately to be real.

But... Whatever. If it's a dream at least it's a nice one.

“Well, despite both your ghostly pallor and the fact that your hands feel as cold as ice, your results are actually quite good,” Ethan announces with a smile of obvious relief as, the monitor having done its job, he pulls the cuff off my arm and drops it on to the coffee-table. “So good, actually, that I'm not going to tempt fate by trying to move you and think, once I get you a blanket that is, you can just stay where you are.”

“So... I'll live?” I whisper, curling my legs back up onto the sofa and, more relieved at not having to move than I want to let on to Ethan, settling myself against the arm.

“You'd better,” he retorts as, his expression closing over, he abruptly walks off and disappears momentarily into the bedroom. Returning with one of the – many – blankets from the bed, he both drapes it and... tucks it... around me before, with a sigh, taking a seat on the coffee-table. “You... Oh God, Will. You have no idea how much you... scared me. When I left I thought you were sound asleep in bed, yet... when I get back you're out here and... so still... that I couldn't help but think...” Trailing off he shakes his head and dredges up a wan smile to flash at me. “It doesn't matter. You're as well as anyone can hope for and that... that's all that matters.”

“I...”

Unsure as to...

Well... Again. Just about everything.

Ethan. The fact that he's even here. The way he's behaving. My... ever-growing sense of hope that this is really... real.

“You...” Trying again to get to the bottom of what's going on, I gesture weakly at Ethan and frown. “Jarvis. I heard... Uh... I thought I heard...”

“Given that I'm getting the impression here that you weren't as sound asleep as I thought you were,” Ethan replies, giving me a knowing look, “you did, you did hear Jarvis.”

“But...” More confused than I was a moment ago – I... did... hear Jarvis, but... he's here? I don't get it – I blink owlishly at Ethan and murmur, “But... What... I don't understand. If you were offered a mission, what are you still doing here?”

His smile broadening, Ethan shrugs and, to my decided bemusement, winks at me. “It's pretty easy, actually,” he states, locking his gaze on mine in a way that makes me think he's wanting to watch my reaction. “And that's that I chose not to accept.” 

Ethan's response being just about the last thing I ever expected to hear – he... refused... a mission? Just... What next? Pigs really will begin to fly? Jane's going to wear a dress and heels for no other reason than she genuinely wants to? – I look him in the eye, open my mouth in anticipation of issuing forth with an intelligent reply and...

Promptly begin to cough.

“Keep this up and I just might start to think that you're allergic to me,” Ethan mutters drily as he snatches up a fresh tissue and hands it over to me. “It's okay, Will. I know it's not something you probably thought you'd ever hear pass my lips, but... I chose not to accept the mission. That's all. As tonight's New Year's Eve, I...”

“It.. is?” I gasp between hacking coughs as once again shocked by Ethan's somewhat... matter-of-fact... response, I stare at him through eyes that, even if they only look half as wide as they feel, probably seem to him as though they're bugging right out of my head. 

New Year's Eve?

It...

It can't be.

And the reason it can't be is because it means that...

“I... Christmas... I missed Christmas?” I query faintly as, looking increasingly concerned, Ethan leans forward and places his hand on my knee. “Why... Why didn't anyone tell me?”

“No one told you because we decided knowing it wouldn't help you any,” he murmurs. “Yes. You missed Christmas, but it doesn't really matter as we've already worked out that we'll just have our own Christmas when you're well enough. So... Cheer up and stop looking so mortified. If it helps, the fact that you're still with us is all that any of us wanted for Christmas anyway.”

“I'm still sorry,” I whisper, trying not to think about how much Benji loves Christmas and how, especially as he'd been going on about it since the beginning of November, he'd been looking forward to it. “I... I ruined Christmas, and...”

“You didn't ruin Christmas,” Ethan interrupts, scowling. “The mother fucking cartel did... their very best to ruin it, but not you... and you're not to ever think that you did. Christmas happens every year, but... there's only one of you and, again, knowing that you were going to make it was the only gift any of us wanted anyway.”

“Uh... Okay.” I missed Christmas, and New Year's Eve has crept up on me without me even being aware of it, but... Okay. Ethan seems okay with it all and, well, seeing as I didn't know it at the time and there's not really anything I can do about it now, I just need to make an effort to push the fact that I... lost... the festive season out of my mind and... move on.

Move on and, because it suddenly strikes me as the natural thing to do, place my hand over Ethan's. “But... Back to New Year's Eve. What's that got to do with not accepting a mission?”

“A lot, actually,” Ethan replies cryptically as, lowering his head, he looks down at our hands in preference to meeting my eyes. “You see, I came to something of a realisation while you were in the coma...”

Oh. Coma. That's right. Ooops. There really is just no help for it and the gaps in my memory are nothing if not on the... immense... side. 

Christmas. Coma.

Wonder what else I might be missing?

Actually, on second thoughts... Do I even want to know?

“Uh... Will? Are you even listening to me?”

And... There you have it. Something else I'm currently missing.

The ability to concentrate.

“Sorry,” I murmur, flashing Ethan an apologetic smile as – yet again, because it strikes me as the most natural of things to do – I slide my hand under his and entwine our fingers. “Forgetting that I'd been in a coma, missing Christmas, it... Uh... It's all just a bit too much for me, I think.”

“Then perhaps this conversation can wait for another time and I should just get you back into bed,” Ethan replies, gently squeezing my fingers back. “Come on, Will. Let's get you back to bed. I can share my... epiphany... with you when you're feeling more up to hearing it.”

But... I don't want to go back to bed. I'm warm. Comfortable. And I have Ethan, who it honestly seems only ten or so minutes ago I thought was leaving me, directly in my line of sight. Sure, bed might offer up both the warmth and the comfort of my current position, but the line of sight angle would be harder to arrange, and...

Ethan.

I want Ethan.

Shit. That is... I want to hear what he's got to say.

Just...

What the fuck's wrong with me at the moment? Seriously. There's scatter-brained and then there's me. I'm like the poster child for vagueness.

“No. It's okay. I... I'm good where I am,” I respond at long last as, having no intention of going anywhere, I gesture at Ethan with my free hand that he should sit back down. “Well... You know, I'm as good here as I'm likely to be anywhere at the moment, so... Please. I give you my word that you have my undivided attention and that I'm not just going to... vague... out on you again.”

“Look, you don't have...”

“I'm fine.”

“You don't... look... fine.”

“Well, I am.”

“Are you sure that...”

“I'm positive.”

Sighing, Ethan pulls his hand away from mine and, sitting up a little straighter, runs his fingers through his hair. “It's reassuring to see that, if nothing else, your stubbornness hasn't changed,” he mutters, shaking his head. “But... Fine. You win. If you promise not to... zone out... on me again, I'll do my best to explain why I chose not to accept the mission.”

I nod. “I promise.”

Well. Promise to... try, at any rate.

“Okay.” Sighing again, Ethan takes a deep breath and looks directly into my eyes. “The reason I'm still here instead of just having accepted the mission is because it's New Year's Eve and I wanted to see the New Year in... as I plan to continue it.” Pausing, he leans forward and returns his hand to my knee. “And that's with you by my side. Will, I... I realised when you were in a coma and we came so damn close to losing you, that I... That I take your presence in my life for granted and that something has got to give, that... you have to know how I feel about you and how I hope that our friendship can become... more than just a friendship...”

I...

Dear God. I'm... the reason Ethan chose not to accept the mission? He's still here... because of me?

I just...

I don't know what to say. Hell. I'm so taken aback by his... confession... that I don't even have it in me to embark on a coughing attack.

Ethan, he... Rates me higher than a mission and would like more from our friendship?

Uh...

Yes?

No. Make that...

Yes, yes, yes!

“Seeing as you're not even coughing, I'm thinking that I must have really done it this time,” Ethan mutters as, shifting off the coffee-table, he crouches down in front of me and squeezes my knee. “Will? Look. It's okay. I'm sorry if I alarmed you or even... offended you. How I feel about you is... uh... my problem, not yours, and if you're not interested then... then that's fine. I want you to know that it doesn't have to change anything and that we can still be friends. I just... Shit! I'm going about this all...”

“I'm interested,” I whisper, cutting Ethan off mid... apologetic ramble... and causing him to jerk his head up in order to give me an amazed look. “I... I'm sick, and far from thinking at my best, but... you've got to believe me when I say that I'm interested, that I'm... very... interested,” I continue as, with effort, I lean forward and stroke my fingers along his cheek. “When I heard Jarvis and knew that you had a mission, I didn't want you to go. You... You're my friend and, even if I don't show it, I always feel better when you're around. I knew it was selfish of me, but I... I didn't want you to leave me...”

“Well, there you go, I didn't want to leave you either,” Ethan smiles as, looking relieved, he closes his hand tenderly around my wrist and, placing my hand on his cheek, leans into my touch. “While it goes without saying that I could have lived without the whole super-virus coma-thing, I'm thinking now that there may very well be something to look forward to in the New Year after all.”

“An epiphany is... an epiphany,” I reply, using the very tips of my fingers to stroke his cheek bone as, not exactly surprisingly, I can hardly believe the wonderful position I've found myself in. “Oddly enough I could have lived without it all too, but I... I'll take it.”

Of course I'll take it.

I'm still alive, Ethan chose staying by my side over accepting a mission, and...

The future, it really does seem a lot brighter than it did only a short time ago.

“You know, as ways to see the New Year in go,” I add, “I can think of... worse... ways.”

“Worse ways than sitting on a sofa with someone who just happens to look like death warmed up and who coughs all the time?” Ethan retorts with a teasing grin as, releasing my wrist and standing up, he looks down at me appraisingly. “Mmm... You know something though? As I don't actually have it in me to disagree, I think you may well be on to something...”

“Good thing the way to my heart isn't through sweet talk,” I mock grumble as, suddenly, a random – yet, in hindsight, somewhat telling... and made even more glorious for it – memory pops into my head. “The shower!” I exclaim, no doubt apropos of absolutely nothing as far as Ethan's concerned as I look up at him and smile. “The other day, you... showered me and... held me, and...”

“While I don't know about you, it would have had to have been the most content I'd felt in a long time,” Ethan finishes, returning my smile as what looks to be a faint blush momentarily stains his cheeks. “I thought I was taking a risk, but... You were so weak and that asshole of a doctor had made such a mess of you that, really, I didn't know what else I could do. It wasn't, admittedly, how I'd imagined the first time I'd have you naked in my arms would go, but... Knowing now that you were okay with it too, I'll still take it.”

“You did the right thing,” I reply as, to my great annoyance, I have to stifle a yawn, “and, yes... It was definitely the best I'd felt in a long, long time, and I... I'll take it, too. Just... Thank you. For everything.”

For staying.

For wanting me.

For just being... you.

Shrugging, Ethan picks up a Harrods' bag that I hadn't noticed before from the floor and places it on the coffee-table. “Nothing to thank me for,” he responds dismissively as he pulls his cell phone out from his pocket and drops it next to the bag. “I'm sure you'd have done the same for me,” he adds before giving me a funny look and, to my surprise, laughing. “You know, Will, your mind sure does operate in something of a strange way. I mean, the fact you were in a coma seems to have slipped it, yet you can remember the shower...”

“Mmm... But the shower was pleasant,” I murmur as, not content with simply yawning, I can now feel my eyelids wanting to slip shut as well. “Very... pleasant. The coma though? I'm sure not so much. But... Uh... What time is it? I'm really sorry to have to say that if midnight isn't in the next few minutes I'm afraid your vision of seeing New Year's in with me by your side will have to change to.... with me... sleeping... by your side.”

“Don't you worry, it's all in hand,” Ethan replies with the briefest of smug smiles as he glances down at his watch. “For starters, it's barely gone six in the evening. Secondly, I gave Jane and Benji the night off on the provision that they're both near Big Ben when it starts to chime midnight and that they phone me at the time so that we can hear the countdown as well. And, thirdly, despite you not being asleep like I thought you were, and you thinking that I'd headed off on a mission, where I'd actually gone was Harrods to, in the hope of you feeling up to eating something, pick up some chocolates. The more traditional champagne being out because of your pill-popping drug regime, I thought that perhaps seeing the New Year in with chocolate would be the way to go instead...”

Harrods. Big Ben.

London.

Well. There you go. We're in London. 

Not, however, that I'm going to share my surprise at this fact with Ethan as, I don't know, the less he knows about just how off with the fairies I really am the better.

But...

Ethan... Who knows me – and my sweet tooth – well enough to buy chocolate to toast the New Year in with instead of champagne. Mr... Thinks Of Everything, and who I not only know I'd truly would be lost without, but who I'm also incredibly lucky to have.

“It sounds like you've thought of everything,” I mumble through yet another – downright inconsiderate and with completely awful timing – yawn. “So... Uh... You'll wake me just before midnight, yeah?”

“I will,” he confirms, glancing over his shoulder towards the bedroom before looking back at me and shrugging. “Now... Are you comfortable enough there, or do you want me to help you back into bed?”

Move? Even with help, I just seriously don't think so.

Besides...

“Here's good. But...” Drawing on what's left of my energy, I push myself away from the arm of the sofa and pat the freshly vacated seat cushion next to me. “It could be better...”

“Things can always be better,” Ethan responds as, not needing telling twice, he settles himself on the sofa next to me, drapes his arm warmly around my shoulders and plants a quick kiss on my cheek. “You'll see, Will. They can... always... be better.”

“Mmm...” Making myself comfortable, I rest my head on Ethan's chest and close my eyes. “I believe you, but... For now, they're already better...”

Much, much better.

~ end ~


End file.
